Facebook’s Measures to Avoid Controversial Content

As the race to control the expanding online video advertising market heats up, risks seem to be growing—and Facebook (FB) is taking care to avoid them.

The company introduced monetization eligibility standards designed to guarantee advertisers of their brand safety, a contentious issue in the age of digital advertising. The standards spell out guidelines on the kind of content that can carry ads on Facebook. For example, the company will not show ads on content that focuses on conflicts, violence, or tragedy.

Alphabet’s (GOOGL) Google suffered a blow early this year when large advertisers, including Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), Verizon (VZ), and AT&T (T), boycotted YouTube advertising to protest ads running next to controversial content, such as videos promoting terrorism.

Google reacted to the advertiser boycott by introducing a slew of brand safety measures. For example, the company will not allow YouTube channels with less than 10,000 views to run ads, buying itself time to review the quality of the content shared by new channels.

Facebook would like to reduce advertisers’ brand safety concerns. Facebook’s ad monetization eligibility standards aim to make its advertisers feel more confident and more in control of their brand safety. As shown in the chart above, Facebook has more than 5.0 million active advertisers.